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'The Economist' Endorses Obama For President

Official photographic portrait of President Barack Obama. The Economist magazine says give the man four more years. It endorsed Obama on Nov. 1. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

London-based magazine, The Economist, endorsed President Barack Obama on Thursday. It is the second time the world’s leading economics-focused magazine has endorsed Obama, this time by a narrow margin over former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney.

The Economist’s choice turned to two questions: how good of a president has Obama been, especially on the main issues of the economy and foreign policy? And can America really trust Mitt Romney to do a better job?

The magazine said in a press release today that while Obama’s shortcomings are many, Republican challenger Romney has changed his position too often on policy matters.

Romney has over the last month changed his stance on health care and foreign policy issues in a likely move to placate party right wingers.

The Economist said it would have chosen Romney if he had maintained his positions from the first debate, or promoted himself as the Romney that ran Massachusetts in a bipartisan way. Even then, however, Massachusetts is a solid Democratic state, with very few Republicans in the state Congress on Beacon Hill. There is not a whole lot of partisan bickering in the golden domed State House of Massachusetts.

The problem for the magazine was that there were too many versions of Romney—and, as they have outlined — those versions come with a lot of dangerous ideas, including:

Foreign Policy: On foreign policy matters, Romney seems too ready to bomb Iran and he has vowed to label China a currency manipulator, something the U.S. Treasury Department has said China is not.

Government Spending: Although he would slash red tape on the domestic front, Romney said he wants to start with huge tax cuts yet again and dramatically increase defense spending. With what revenues? Magazine editors said, “He is still in the cloud-cuckoo-land of thinking that America’s finances can be dealt with entirely through spending cuts. Backing business is important, but getting the macroeconomics right matters far more.”

Economy: Romney has an economic plan that works only if you don’t believe most of what he says.

Doh!

Despite his shortcomings, President Obama has dragged America’s economy back from the brink of disaster and avoided a double dip recession. Obama has made for a more decent foreign policy, the magazine editors said in the press release.

Gone are the days of color coded terror alerts and committing large swaths of U.S. troops to participate in grudge match wars, like Iraq under George W. Bush, for example.

Lastly, and according to The Economist, “this newspaper would stick with the devil it knows, and re-elect him.”

The full endorsement will be available in the November 3rd issue of the magazine.

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With four more years of Obama we will be a third world country. It seems that is his intention since he has to be aware of the end result of his tax and spend policy. Healthcare reform was his chosen path to control of all Americans. To gain control over peoples lives you must first take away their options. He intends to make everyone depenent on government for their existance, and beggers are easier to satisfy. Misery loves company must explain the position taken by the Economist.

Dont scare yourself. Youre sounding like what liberals said about eight years of Bush. The only thing that happened was, well, the economy crashed. But hey…at least we didnt have world war III!!! And still, no police state.

Bush didn’t cause the economy to crash. It was the culmination of many factors, e.g., ultra-low interest rates, excessive debt, government pushing banks to make bad loans, etc., polices that were supported by Democrats.

The man is a LOON! He can talk a good game but if you ask for a written plan you get a three minute speech about how much he loves middle-class values. His flip-flopping is so obvious that only the totally deluded don’t realized he’s changed his positionon some issues two and three times during this campaign alone. It’s very, very hard to trust a man who has no plan and keeps changing his mind.

By comparison, we know what we’re getting with President Obama. He’s not snowing us with some “Light at the end of the tunnel” speech, and he’s not afraid to quote facts. You can’t escape the fact that it could have been much, much worse for the U.S. economy.

Second, President Obama’s foreign policy is based on something other than condenced “I’ll make American great again” rhetoric. President Obama has worked for four years to build cooperation with other nations that sees America as a leader among the world’s nations rather than just “the bestest nation ev4r”. Right now America is just starting to shake its reputation as “the world’s biggest bully”; why would you want to lose that?

The U.S. currently hosts the ground the U.N. is built on. This penchant for U.N.-bashing by conservatives (including Romney) is…

…I’m sorry, I can’t be more articulate than “all kinds of stupid”. Giving the entire world a Senate with a guaranteed diplomatic option has prevented many wars in an era with more wars than ever before in human history. If America rejoins the community of nations under Obama as a member rather than a would-be-king under Romney, then the world will be more willing to deal with the U.S. than it has been since the 1990s and that means more and better trade, more diplomatic santions, and fewer desperate people around the globe who hate America.

Lastly, if you’re the “What have you done for me lately” type, President Obama’s much-maligned Affordable Care Act is going to provide just that: better and more affordable health care for Americans and spurr on efficiency across the medical system beginning in 2015. Just give it a chance to kick in. If that’s not good enough for you, Romney’s been endlessly repeating the sound byte that Obama came up 9 million jobs short of his original campaign promise to reduce unemployment. That’s 0.03% short of his target. Despite a lousy starting position and relentless opposition by Repiblicans, Obama has gotten a B+ average in his first term. He definately deserves a second term more than his predecessor did.

So Mr. Forbes, maybe it is time to get behind Obama. You cannot possibly with good conscience be behind Romney. With The Koch Brothers, Adelson, Limbaugh, The Fox Team, Akin, Muirdoch, Prairiebus, etc. The poor guy really did not have a chance from the very beginning. Fake, scared, permanent bad conscience, no personality, etc. All that was obvious before they even started. The “strategic brain-trust” from Bain got it all wrong. Congratulations to McKinsey, BCG, Accenture, etc. Anyway, Mr. Forbes, your intellectual reputation is at stake. There is no such thing as being “neutral” in important matters. Not even for market-share considerations.

It is a huge loss for America that the right chose such a bad nominee. There is no contrast between Obama & Obama lite.

I hope to god Romney loses, & the conservatives crawl out from under their rock.

America is off the hook liberal because Romney is an absolute moron.

I don’t think he is even smart enough to comprehend how many times he has flip flopped. He just mindlessly vies (lies) for votes so much so that it leaves you spinning in circles watching him so much that all you get is dizzy.